The European Tribune is a forum for thoughtful dialogue of European and international issues. You are invited to post comments and your own articles.
Please REGISTER to post.
Human population has been growing exponentially since very early on
The industrial evolution rate change was clear, indeed. Perhaps most populations were growing at >1% rate most of the time - but the "exceptional" setbacks are parts of the game, and their probability increases with the population number approaching habitat limitations. As for the modern demographic transition... I would not take it for granted. It is hard to delineate how much emancipation, austerities are natural or labored.
(Wanna assume total K millenia? Take the K-th root 1.023, or roughly divide 2.3% by K.)
That's still exponential growth ... since from at the very latest the second diaspora from Africa (as its conceivable that the first diaspora along the southern Asian coasts to Australia was more or less linear growth).
Its not logistic growth if keeps on growing at a growing rate. Since, evidently, logistic growth at a ceiling population that falls short of the population to fill up Africa, Eurasia and the Americas at a hunter gatherer density would have left big chunks of one or more continents empty of humans ... as we see big chunks of multiple continents empty of pretty much any other single species of primate.
Its not logistic growth with a ceiling at hunter gatherer densities worldwide if the growth continues to lead to population densities that require the additional work of settled agriculture.
Discussing how many doublings its been since what some evidence, including genetic evidence, suggests was passage through a demographic bottleneck in southern Africa is not disputing whether or not its exponential growth ... its only about estimating the exponential rate.
As far as demographic transition ... I deliberately phrased it as a potential, rather than a certainty. Its hard to sit writing in Beijing, now at twice the population of my home state of Ohio and still growing, and take it as a certainty. I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.
Its hard to sit writing in Beijing, now at twice the population of my home state of Ohio and still growing, and take it as a certainty.
According to Rosling, China is at its peak. What is more, it has a 200 million decline in the pipeline as larger generations die and smaller are born.
Beijing will probably keep growing though, I think capital size is mostly a reflection of concentration of power.
10,000 BC - 6 millions 400 BC - 153 millions 0 - 252 millions 200 - 257 600 - 208 (Justinian plague) 1000 - 253 1200 - 400 1340 - 442 1400 - 375 (Black plague) 1500 - 461 1600 - 578 1700 - 680 1750 - 771 1800 - 954 1850 - 1241 1900 - 1634 1950 - 2520 2000 - 6236
das monde:
Perhaps most populations were growing at >1% rate most of the time
Looks that way, yes.
but the "exceptional" setbacks are parts of the game, and their probability increases with the population number approaching habitat limitations
But it is not planned or genetic.
Let's translate the numbers into implied doubling periods: 10000 BC - 400 BC: 2055 years; 400 BC - 0: 556 years; 0 - 200: 7056 years; 200 - 600: minus 1311 years ("decay"); 600 - 1000: 1416 years; 1000 - 1200: 303 years; 1200 - 1340: 972 years; 1340 - 1400: minus 253 years; 1400 - 1500: 336 years; 1500 - 1600: 306 years; 1600 - 1700: 427 years; 1700 - 1750: 276 years; 1750 - 1800: 163 years; 1800 - 1850: 132 years; 1850 - 1900: 126 years; 1900 - 1950: 80 years; 1950 - 2000: 38 years.
That is a wild variation. And the industrial "singularity" is staggering, isn't it?
For comparison, the implied biblical doubling period is about 190 years.
I cannot prove, but would not be surprised to find, that a large part of the superexponentiality of the post-1500 is simply an artifact of more fine-meshed census efforts. Getting better at counting almost always means you find more of what you are counting.
- Jake Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.
How evidence-direct are the estimates?
Livi-Bacci gets the numbers (except 1950 and 2000, those are from the UN) from Essai sur l'évolution du nombre des hommes on JSTOR.
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 24 15 comments
by Oui - Jan 20 53 comments
by Oui - Jan 23 19 comments
by gmoke - Jan 24
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 14 57 comments
by gmoke - Jan 22 2 comments
by Oui - Jan 10 61 comments
by Oui - Jan 21 10 comments
by ATinNM - Jan 261 comment
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 2415 comments
by Oui - Jan 2319 comments
by gmoke - Jan 222 comments
by Oui - Jan 2110 comments
by Oui - Jan 2053 comments
by Oui - Jan 2011 comments
by Oui - Jan 172 comments
by Oui - Jan 1610 comments
by gmoke - Jan 16
by IdiotSavant - Jan 1521 comments
by Oui - Jan 1449 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 1457 comments
by Oui - Jan 1390 comments
by Oui - Jan 1177 comments
by Oui - Jan 1061 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 877 comments
by Oui - Jan 772 comments
by Frank Schnittger - Jan 710 comments